


Flowers for Shiro

by AnnaofAza



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Cults, Cult Leader Lotor, Cult Member Keith, Grinding, Investigator Shiro, M/M, Plot What Plot/Porn Without Plot, Seduction
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-27
Updated: 2021-02-27
Packaged: 2021-03-15 18:34:49
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,571
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29318712
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AnnaofAza/pseuds/AnnaofAza
Summary: There's loyalty in Keith, though, a fierce pillar of it. Anyone would want that, especially a man like Lotor, to bottle it up and give it to everyone to sip. A man could rule the world with Keith standing behind—or beside—him.Or, Shiro infiltrates a cult and discovers a few things.
Relationships: Keith/Lotor (Voltron), Keith/Shiro (Voltron)
Comments: 20
Kudos: 102





	Flowers for Shiro

Takashi Shirogane is the best in the business, and he knows it.

He has to credit his small team of the Holt siblings, but there’s a reason federal intelligence agencies have his proverbial number on speed dial. He can slip inside the most reclusive communities, then go for months—even years, though more rarely—without losing himself. His evidence is impeccable, armed with cameras and listening devices smaller than a pencil tip, and can often get normally jittery or reclusive people to testify for court proceedings.

It’s broken up a few relationships—particularly an engagement—but Shiro doesn’t want to stop. Every person saved and every criminal locked up help soften the unsaved, the failures. Not much, but everything, everyone counts. 

That’s why he’s chosen to go undercover at Lotor’s commune. On the outside, it looks like a clean living, environmentally-friendly ranch, flower crowns on every head and sweetly-scented incense drifting with the breeze. 

But inside, as always, holds a dark secret. A young woman had come to them, barefoot and trembling, begging them to find her brother, who Shiro privately believed (but did not say, he had that much sense) was already dead.

Shiro arranges for witness protection, grows his hair and some stubble, and ships out first thing in the morning.

His first thought is that the cult members, as usual, are worshipful—brainwashed is the right word—of Lotor, hair as white as moonlight and teeth so pointed that Shiro suspects a cosmetic procedure. He's silver-tongued, intelligent, good-looking, and an overly-controlling bastard, a classic profile. 

Yet even under the adoring light of his followers, Lotor has what he calls “generals,” flanking him at all hours, coated in armor. And more unusually, they seem to guard Lotor’s replacement as fiercely when Lotor leaves the commune with volunteers who often do not return. 

Shiro does not often see cult leaders delegating their authority, let alone allowing someone to rule “as if his word is my own,” and Keith looks more like the adoring maidens or cabana boy-like attendants than the hardboiled, stern-faced generals. He often has a flower, usually presented to him by Lotor in front of envious gazes, tucked behind his ear, with flowing purple robes. The material’s gauzy, freely showing bare skin underneath the fabric.

Yet he doesn’t seem to be either a pet or a consort. Shiro can see Lotor touching his shoulder in greeting or offering him bits off his plate in the canteen, but nothing overtly romantic or sexual. It’s not like they’re fucking at the head of the table, exclusive partners in an orgy, or even sneaking away together during the day—all Shiro has seen before.

And Keith talks back to Lotor.

The first time he did it, insulting a plan to his face, Shiro had frozen in place, waiting for Lotor's fury to come down. 

But Lotor only laughed and stroked Keith's cheek. "Menace," he'd said. "And of course you're right." 

Yes, Keith's fiery in a way he's never seen glassy-eyed converts be. Yet he shows no desire to leave or to even sit himself in Lotor's place. 

From what Shiro can gather, Keith's been there since the beginning. Perhaps he's playing the long game, waiting for a slice of power to come to him, a final reward. Perhaps he's been promised something that entices him to stay. Perhaps he's has a foolish schoolboy crush or a stubborn blind singlemindedness that's all too easily confused with love. 

No, Shiro senses, it's not that. 

There's loyalty in Keith, though, a fierce pillar of it. Anyone would want that, especially a man like Lotor, to bottle it up and give it to everyone to sip. A man could rule the world with Keith standing behind—or beside—him. 

This cult is geared towards eugenics, creating the perfect human race—something Shiro’s also seen before—so he has to play it to his advantage. He knows he’s fit, relatively attractive, and strong, with military experience: a good candidate right out of the gate. He needs to charm his way into Lotor’s missions, but not too quickly so he may learn the inner workings of the cult. 

But getting there? Lotor’s definitely more reserved, always on alert, so Keith may be the key.

And Shiro gets an unexpected chance one night.

* * *

It’s after curfew that Keith comes to Shiro’s room.

Tiny flowers are wound in his hair like a veil, the folds of his robe—white, this time—are exposed to reveal his collarbone, the outline of his nipples.

Shiro sits up, but doesn’t reach for the light switch. “You shouldn’t be here,” he says sternly, as if Keith is a child, like a good obedient cult member. “It’s past lights out.”

Keith only smiles and comes forward, padding softly across the wooden floorboards on bare feet. Around his left ankle is a chain of purple flowers; Shiro wonders if Keith wove them or Lotor himself gave them to him, pressed into his hand with a kiss. 

“What are you doing?” he asks, frantic in almost a real way. He doesn’t know all the rules just yet, but he’s sure Lotor’s... people belong to him and him only.

Keith continues smiling, so breezily that Shiro wonders if he’s drugged. But his eyes are clear, his movements deliberate as he steps in a perfectly straight line to the foot of Shiro’s bed. Yet there’s a sinuousness to his movement, like a cat in the sunshine.

Shiro definitely sits up straighter when Keith climbs onto the bed on all fours. The fabric parts further, and Shiro tries to look away from the bare thighs, the newly exposed skin. If this a loyalty test, he may be botching it already; Shiro’s been sent honeytraps before, but Keith seems to easily knock down his defenses.

And Keith continues crawling until his face meets Shiro’s. His lips are stained a bright red, and his breath smells of the berries everyone freely picks off the bushes. “I want you to get me out of here.”

It takes all his years of training not to react. “What are you talking about?” he asks, allowing the rough edge of sleep to come through, to disguise his surprise.

Keith’s voice is low—and very, very close to his face. “You know what I’m talking about.” His hand slides up to Shiro’s bare chest, thumb centered over his nipple, and when he touches Shiro’s cheek with his left hand, Shiro can feel himself tremble.

“No,” Shiro breathes back.

“No?” Keith echoes, almost teasingly. “I know you.”

Shiro forces himself to look at the now closed door, the corner of the bed, anything, even as his traitorous hands reach to cup Keith’s thighs. No weapons, he tells himself, almost crazily.

“My daddy was a private eye,” Keith breathes. “Let’s just say I was reminded of some things.” He dips down, and presses his mouth over Shiro’s throat, as if he’s going to rip it open. Shiro’s breath falters.

“I don’t—”

“Want your evidence?” Keith’s hips press into Shiro’s thighs, and Shiro is painfully, painfully hard. “Consider me that.”

“You don’t seem like you want to run,” Shiro manages.

“And you don’t seem like you do, either.” Keith shifts once, a forward tilt of his hips; Shiro can feel the warmth, the wetness through his sleeping pants. “The last person to try to leave was Romelle,” Keith continues, and suddenly smiles wide, as if Shiro’s given something away. He hopes not. “I haven’t seen her since.”

Shiro’s frozen underneath him, mind spinning. Is this the truth? Is Keith trying to catch him in a lie? Did Lotor send him? Is Romelle on this somehow?

Keith leans in; his eyelashes are dark, a faint—almost invisible—scar cutting across his cheek. “He does that, you know. Takes people and blots them out, but oftentimes they walk straight into the fire. You see volunteers lining up for his little missions, and the more that they’re gone, the more _beg_ to be picked for the next one.”

Shiro’s teeth bite into his lower lip, as Keith’s hand trails down his cheek, skimming over each of his ribs, brushes a thumb against his peaked nipple, skates back to his throat, presses once.

“If this is true,” Shiro breathes, “then why didn’t you run with her?”

“He keeps me close,” Keith says, lips against Shiro’s ear. “And who do you think was distracting him while Romelle ran?”

Shiro wants to dip his hands lower, touch the silky inside of Keith’s thighs, desire rising in his throat. Fabric slides further down, over Keith’s shoulder, over back, pale as moonlight. The flowers have a scent, nearly as sweet as the berries. “I…”

“I’ll owe you everything.” A hand reaches down, underneath the covers, squeezes Shiro’s cock once. “I’ll give you anything.”

Pressure’s building, sweat forming on his brow. His throat feels dry. “Keith…”

“You’ll help me, then?” Keith leans in, pecks his cheek, and in that moment, Shiro forgets everything as he whites out, slapping his palm, still warm from Keith's thighs, across his mouth. “Promise me?”

Shiro can barely whisper back, “I promise.”

Keith smiles again, moving back to sit on his heels. His head tilts to the side, considering, before he swings his legs off the bed. 

“Good night, then,” he coos, before vanishing, and Shiro's left with nothing more than a sticky belly and a few crushed petals lingering on his skin. 


End file.
